“MOG” is widely used in the art to refer to “material other than grain”.
Agricultural harvesters comprise a processing device that comprises a thresher. Harvested crop is introduced into the processing device in a raw form, in which stalks may still be present and the grain is still in the ears. The thresher separates grain kernels from other plant parts, such as stalks, ears, husks and the like. The threshed grain leaves the processing device to be transported to a storage facility, such as a grain tank. The separated MOG is discharged from the agricultural harvester. Often, the processing device additionally comprises one or more sieves, to improve the separation between grain kernels and MOG, with the objective to transport a little chaff and other undesired material to the grain tank along with the threshed grain.
The effectiveness and efficiency of threshing is not easy to control as it depends on many variables and because it is hard to measure.
US2009/0297040 discloses a method and device for crop particle discrimination. This device and method can be used to determine how much chaff is present in the grain-MOG mixture that travels from the processing device to the grain tank. If too much chaff is present, the processing device is likely in need of re-adjustment of some of the processing parameters.
In US2009/0297040, an optical method is proposed to discriminate between grain kernels and chaff. It relies on the difference in reflectivity of the grain kernel and the chaff